Make a Frozen inspired obstacle course
You’ll need
- Something to mark lines (for example, chalk, masking tape, or rope)
- Equipment to make your obstacle course
Before you begin
- Use the safety checklist to help you plan and risk assess your activity. Additional help to carry out your risk assessment, including examples can be found here. Don’t forget to make sure all young people and adults involved in the activity know how to take part safely.
- Make sure you’ll have enough adult helpers. You may need some parents and carers to help if you’re short on helpers.
Planning and setting up the activity
- Try to set up the obstacle course before young people arrive. You’ll need an adult or young leaders to monitor the obstacle course to make sure no-one uses the equipment or plays on it during arrival or any free-time, so everyone stays safe.
- In your space, create an obstacle course that's suitable for the space, young people’s ability and equipment you have. We've added some suggestions for setting up your obstacle course below.
- You can adapt any of the suggestions based on the needs of your group and space.
- You may need some extra helpers, such as parents, carers or young leaders, to be at each activity station or obstacle.
Explore the story of Frozen
- Gather everyone together in a circle. Ask if anyone has watched the film Frozen.
- Ask if anyone knows what happens in the story. Can someone tell the group who the story is about and what they do?
- If you need a reminder of what happens in Frozen, you may consider watching a video of Olaf retelling the story. If you don’t have access to a device and the internet, you could find and bring a copy of the story.
- Ask if anyone can think of how the characters in Frozen worked as a team to save Arendelle. Can anyone think of any examples? Princess Anna, Olaf, Kristoff and Sven worked as a team to help Queen Elsa and save Arendelle.
- Discuss with the group why it's important to work as a team, and how everyone can bring different ideas and skills to help one-another. Can anyone think of a time they worked as a team?
- Explain to everyone that they’re going to work together to complete a Frozen inspired obstacle course to go on an adventure and help save Arendelle.
Running the activity
- Split everyone into teams depending on how much space and equipment you have. If you have enough for two teams to run at the same time, split the group into two teams.
- Next, ask everyone to get into pairs. Tell everyone that they’re going to work in pairs to complete the obstacle course.
- Show everyone the obstacle course and explain each step. You should tell them how each challenge links to what they’ve seen in Frozen, then demonstrate how to complete the obstacle safely.
- Get everyone to line up at the start of the obstacle course in order to begin.
These obstacles are suggestions, each linked to a scene in Frozen. You can use more or fewer obstacles, as well as adapt each one, depending on the space, abilities and equipment you have.
- Queen Elsa and Princess Anna are sisters. Growing up they would have fun playing in the snow and building snowmen.
- Obstacle: Make a hopscotch on the ground out of chalk or masking tape, then have people jump across it, just like Queen Elsa and Princess Anna would have while playing in the snow.
- When Queen Elsa and Princess Anna were little, they built a snowman and called him Olaf. Using her superpowers, Queen Elsa brings Olaf to life and we become one of the group.
- Obstacle: Put out some cones around a designated space. Have the young people collect 3 cones and stack them to build their own snowman
- Princess Anna goes on an epic adventure with the help of Kristoff, Olaf, and Sven to find Queen Elsa at the ice castle.
- Obstacle: Use masking tape on the floor to create a balancing path for people to walk along, as Princess Anna and Kristoff travel to find Queen Elsa. You could add cones as obstacles to make an even trickier path for the group to overcome.
- While searching for Queen Elsa, Princess Anna, Kristoff and Sven come across wolves in the forest. They work together to distract the wolves.
- Obstacle: Using a tennis racquet or cricket bat, one team member tosses the ball and the other has to hit it.
- Having distracted the wolves, the group see a cliff in the distance which they must jump across to safety.
- Obstacle: Set out five or six hoops or floor dots that people can jump between, pretending to jump over the cliff edge.
- Queen Elsa uses her powers to build her ice palace.
- Obstacle: Try to throw some balls into a bucket to show Elsa striking ice and snow to build the palace. You need to get one in to move on.
- Princess Anna protects her sister Queen Elsa from danger, stepping in-front of Hans when he tries to hurt her.
- Obstacle: One team member stands still, the other moves around them in a circle five times. Once they have done five circles, they both shout ‘freeze’. The person moving then freezes in a star position in front of them
- Kristoff and Anna go to meet the trolls. They roll over in excitement when Kristoff takes Princess Anna to meet them and break Queen Elsa's icy spell.
- Obstacle: Have three skittles or soft things that can be knocked down set up. Bowl and knock them over to move on.
- Anna makes her way back to Arendelle to meet Prince Hans in order to break the spell put on her by Queen Elsa's powers. However, he locks Princess Anna in the castle. With the help of Olaf, Princess Anna breaks free from the castle, finding Kristoff and Sven who help break the spell. When you have a strong team, you can do anything!
- Obstacle: Using a gently-tied Necker or purpose made three-legged race bands to have a three-legged race between two cones. This shows Anna and Olaf supporting each other on the ice. Make sure no material is left dangling, as this could be a trip hazard.
- Queen Elsa embraces her icy powers, letting go of the judgement and fears of others to be her true self. She realises love is the answer to save the day.
- Obstacle: Have some sticky notes and felt tips. Write down or draw your superpower or something you love about yourself on a sticky note and stick it to the closest wall.
- At the end of Frozen, the sisters hug, and Elsa realised that love was the key to thawing the winter. Elsa opens up the gates to Arendelle Castle for the first time in forever, inviting the community to celebrate her coronation.
- Obstacle: Have the whole team make a hand tunnel. The pair who just did the course have to run under the hand tunnel in order to finish.
Reflection - Feel, don't conceal
This activity was all about completing an obstacle course as a team. We had to work together as we recreated moments inspired by Frozen in an obstacle course. It was very active!
Think about all the obstacles. Which did you enjoy the most? What stage did you find the easiest? How about the hardest?
We had to work as a team. Which obstacles required the most teamwork? Did you and your partner work well together? Which obstacles did you each find the easiest and hardest? Did you help each other on these? What could you do to be an even better team next time?
This activity also allowed us to explore the importance of friendship and community. We know that in Frozen, everyone had to work together to help save Arendelle. In Frozen, Queen Elsa runs away from her community because she is worried the people of Arendelle will fear her and her powers. At the end of the film, we saw Queen Elsa open the gates to Arendelle and invite people in. Everyone became accepting of Queen Elsa, and it showed that love and acceptance are the most powerful superpower of them all.
How could we make love our superpower? What could we do to help our community and friends? And how could we make sure we always work as a team?
Safety
All activities must be safely managed. You must complete a thorough risk assessment and take appropriate steps to reduce risk. Use the safety checklist to help you plan and risk assess your activity. Always get approval for the activity, and have suitable supervision and an InTouch process.
- Contact games and activities
Make sure everyone understands what contact is acceptable, and monitor contact throughout the activity.
- Active games
The game area should be free of hazards. Explain the rules of the game clearly and have a clear way to communicate that the game must stop when needed. Take a look at our guidance on running active games safely.
To make this activity easier or harder, change the difficulty of the obstacle course. You could add in fewer or more obstacles.
- Make sure that all the obstacles are adapted for everyone to use, such as leaving wider gaps between cones for wheelchair users or throwing a ball instead of kicking it.
- Make sure there’s a role for everyone. If someone doesn’t want to complete the course, could they be the timekeeper or help start people on the course?
All Scout activities should be inclusive and accessible.
Discover some more Disney characters as you try out our other Disney activities
You could let each pair set up an obstacle each for everyone to do, so that young people are both building and completing the course.